Without, let sects parade it how they list,
Nor church, nor unity can e'er subsist;
The name may be usurp'd, but want of pow'r
Will show the Babel, high or low the tow'r.

And where the same behaviour shall appear
In outward form, that was in Christ so clear,
There is the very outward church that he
Will'd all mankind to show, and all to see;
Of which whoever shows it, from the heart,
Is both an inward, and an outward part.

What excommunication can deprive
A pious soul, that is in Christ alive,
Of church communion? or cut off a limb
That life and action both unite to him?
For any circumstance of place, or time,
Or mode, or custom, which infers no crime?

If he be that which his beloved John
Calls him, "The light enlight'ning ev'ry one
That comes into the world"-will he exclude
One from his church, whose mind he has renew'd
To such degree, as to exert, in fact,
Like inward temper, and like outward act?

Invisible, and visible effect,

Of true church membership, in each respect,
Let the one shepherd from above behold;
The flocks, howe'er dispers'd, are his one fold;
Seen by their hearts, and their behaviour too,
They all stand present in his gracious view.

PART THIRD.

A LOCAL union, on the other hand,
Tho' crowded numbers should together stand,
Joining in one same form of pray'r, and praise,
Or creed express'd in regulated phrase,
Or aught beside tho' it assume the name
Of Christian church, may want the real claim.

For if it want the spirit, and the sign,
That constitute all worship, as divine,
The love within, the test of it without,
In vain the union passes for devout;
Heartless, and tokenless if it remain,
It ought to pass, in strictness, for profane.

At first, an unity of heart and soul,

A distribution of an outward dole,
And ev'ry member of the body fed,
As equally belonging to the head,
With what it wanted, was, without suspense,
True church communion, in full Christian sense.

Whether averse the many, or the few,
To hold communion in this righteous view,
Their thought commences heresy, their deed
Schismatical, tho' they profess the creed;
Ways of distributing, if new, should still
Maintain the old communicative will;

Broken by ev'ry loveless, thankless thought,
And not behaving as a Christian ought;
By want of meekness, or a show of pride
Tow'rds any soul for whom our Saviour dy'd;
While this continues, men may pray, and preach
In all their forms, but none will heal their breach.

Whatever helps an outward form may bring To church communion, it is not the thing;

Nor a society, as such, nor place,
Nor any thing besides uniting grace:
They are but accessories, at the most,
To true communion of the Holy Ghost.

This is th' essential fellowship, the tie
Which all true Christians are united by;
No other union does them any good,
But that which Christ cemented with his blood,
As God and man; that, baving lost it, men
Might live in unity with God again.

What he came down to bring us from above
Was grace and peace, and law-fulfilling love;
True spirit-worship, which his father sought,
Was the sole end of what he did, and taught;
That God's own church and kingdom might begin,
Which Moses and the prophets usher'd in.

PART FOURTH.

"THE church of Christ, as thus you represent,
And all the world is of the same extent:
Jews, Turks, or Pagans may be members too;
This, some may call a dreadful mystic clue,
A combination of the Quaker schemes
With latitudinarian extremes."

They may; but names, so ready at the call
Of such as want them, have no force at all
To overthrow momentous truths, and plain,
The very points of scripture, and the main;
Such as distinguish, in the clearest view,
Th' enlighten'd Christian from the half-blind Jew.
What did the sheet let down to Peter mean,
Who call'd the Gentiles common, or, unclean?
Let Peter answer" God was pleas'd to show
That I should call no man whatever so;
In ev'ry nation he that serves him right
Is clean, accepted, in his equal sight."

If Peter said so, who will question Paul?
He, in a manner, made this point his all;
The real sense of what has here been said
In mystic Paul is plainly to be read;
Nothing but obstinate dislike to terms
Obscures what all the Testament affirms.

A

The Jews objected, to his gospel clue,

"What advantage therefore hath the Jew? Or, of what use is to be circumcis'd?" So may some Christians say-to be baptis'd?May form like questions, like conclusions draw, Aud urge the church, as they did, and the law.

Th' apostle's reas'ning from the common want
Of God's free grace, its universal grant
By Jesus Christ, its reach to all mankind,
For whom the same salvation was design'd,
Shows that his church, as boundless as his grace,
Extends itself to all the human race.

With pious Jews of old our king imply'd
The one true king of all the Earth beside;
Whose regal right, tho' he was pleas'd to call
Jacob his lot, extended over all;
Tho' Israel gloried in acknowledg'd light,
It's virtue was not bounded by their sight.

So will a Christian piety confess

A church of Christ, with boundaries no less;

THE church consider'd only as possest Of England, Rome, Geneva-and the restNotion of church so popularly rife, Such cause of endless enmity and strife, Did but arise in a succeeding hour, When Christians came to have a worldly pow'r.

The first apostles spread, from place to place,
The gospel news of universal grace;
Inviting ali to enter, by belief,

Into the church of their redeeming chief;
Entrance accessible in ev'ry part,
And shut to nothing but a faithless heart.

But when the princes of the world became,
And kings, protectors of the Christian name,
Pow'r made ambitious pastors, ease remiss,
And churches dwindl'd into that and this;
The one, divided, came to want, of course,
Supports quite foreign to its native force.

Contentions rose, all tending to create
Still new alliances of church and state;
Form'd, and reform'd, and turn'd, and overturn'd,
As force prevail'd, and human passion burn'd;
Old revolutions when by new dissolv'd,
Both church and state accordingly revolv'd.

Such is the mixture of an human sway, In all external churches at this day; To the same changes liable, anew, That forms of government are subject to; While the one church, in its true sense, in name And thing, remains unchangeably the same.

The private Christian, bearing Christ in mind,
Whose kingdom was not of a worldly kind,
Has little, or has no concern at all,
With these external changes that befall;
Let Providence permit them, or prevent,
With truth and spirit he remains content,

Not that he thinks that evil, more or less,
Is, in its nature, alter'd by success;
The good is good, tho' suff'ring a defeat,
The bad but worse, if its success be great;
He measures neither by th' event that's past,
For what they were at first they are at last.

But, by the spirit of the gospel, free,
Whatever state of government it be,
That God has plac'd him under, to submit,
So in the church he thinks the freedom fit,
Whilst on occasion of the outward part,
He can present what God requires an heart.

PART SIXTH.

THE heart is what the God of it demands, Who dwelleth not in temples made with hands: When hands have made them, if no hearts are Dispos'd aright to consecrate the ground, [found,

Vainly is worship said to be divine,
While in the breast its object has no shrine.

But if it has, in that devoted breast,
A right intention, surely, will be blest;
Tho' forms, prescrib'd by pastors in the chair,
Should be adjusted with less perfect care;
Tho', in some points, the services assign'd
Differ from those of apostolic kind.

What outward church, or form, shall we select,
That is not chargeable with some defect?
Each is prepar'd, in all the rest, to grant
A superfluity, or else a want,

Or both; a distance from perfection wide,
Retorted on itself by all beside.

What safer remedy than pure intent
To seck the good by any of them meant?
Which he, who mindeth only what the heart
Brings of its own, is ready to impart;
No human pow'r, should it enjoin amiss
A ceremonious rite, can hinder this.

Even in sacrament, what frequent storms
Has superstition rais'd about the forms?
In rites baptismal, which the true result?
Immersion? sprinkling? infants? or th' adult?
In the Lord's supper, does the celebration
Make trans, or con, or non-substantiation?

These, and a world of controversies more Serve to enlarge the bibliothecal store; While champions make antiquity their boast, And all pretend to imitate it most; Prone to neglect, for criticising pique, Essential truths eternally antique.

Thus inward worship lies in low estate,
Opprest with endless volumes of debate
About the outward; soon as old ones die,
All undecided, comes a new supply
Of needless doubts to a religious soul,
Whose upright meaning dissipates the whole.

Clear of all worldly, interested views,
The one design of worship it pursues;
Turns all to use that public form allows,
By off'ring up its ever private vows
For the success of all the good design'd
By Christ, the common saviour of mankind.

PART SEVENTH.

A CHRISTIAN, in so catholic a sense, Can give to none, but partial minds, offence: Forc'd to live under some divided part, He keeps entire the union of the heart; The sacred tie of love; by which alone, Christ said, that his disciples would be known.

He values no distinction, as profest By way of separation from the rest; Oblig'd in duty, and inciin'd by choice, In all the good of any to rejoice; From ev'ry evil, falshood, or mistake, To wish them free, for common comfort's sake.

Freedom, to which the most undoubted way Lies in obedience (where it always lay)

To Christ himself; who, with an inward call,
Knocks at the door, that is, the heart of all;
At the reception of this heav'nly guest,
All good comes in, all evil quits the breast.

The free receiver, then, becomes content
With what God orders, or does not prevent:
To them that love him, all things, he is sure,
Must work for good; tho' how may be obscure:
Even successful wickedness, when past,.
Will bring, to them, some latent good at last.

Fall'n as divided churches are, and gone
From the perfection of the Christian one,
Respect is due to any, that contains
The venerable, tho' but faint remains

Of ancient rule, which had not, in its view,
The letter only, but the spirit too.

When that variety of new-found ways
Which people so run after, in our days,
Has done ite utmost-when "lo here, lo there,"
Shall yield to inward seeking, and sincere;
What was, at first, may come to be again
The praise of church assemblies amongst men.

Mean while, in that to which we now belong,
To mind in public lesson, pray'r, and song,
Teaching, and preaching, what conduces best
To true devotion in the private breast,
Willing increase of good to ev'ry soul,
Seems to be our concern upon the whole.

So God, and Christ, and holy angels stand
Dispos'd to ev'ry church, in ev'ry land;
The growth of good still helping to complete
Whatever tares be sown amongst the wheat:
Who would not wish to have, and to excite,
A disposition so divinely right?

A DYING SPEECH.

FROM MR. LAW.

In this unhappily divided state,
That Christian churches have been in of late,
One must, however catholic the heart,
Join, and conform to some divided part:
The church of England is the part, that I
Have always liv'd in, and now choose to die;
Trusting, that if I worship God with her,
In spirit, and in truth, I shall not err;
But as acceptable to him be found,
As if, in times for one pure church renown'd,
Born, I had also liv'd, in heart and soul,
A faithful member of the unbroken whole.
As I am now, by God's good will, to go
From this disorder'd state of things below;
Into his bands as I am now to fall,
Who is the great creator of us all;
God of all churches that implore his aid,
Lover of all the souls that he hath made;
Whose kingdom, that of universal love,
Must have its blest inhabitants above,
From ev'ry class of men, from all the good,
Howe'er descended from one human blood;
So, in this loving spirit, I desire,
As in the midst of all their sacred quire,
With rites prescrib'd, and with a Christian view,
Of all the world to take my last adieu;

Willing in heart and spirit to unite
With ev'ry church, in what is just and right,
Holy and good, and worthy, in its kind,
Of God's acceptance from an honest mind:
Praying, that ev'ry church may have its saints,
And rise to that perfection which it wants.

Father! thy kingdom come! thy sacred will
May all the tribes of human race fulfil!
Thy name be prais'd by ev'ry living breath,
Author of life, and vanquisher of Death!

A COMMENT

ON THE FOLLOWING SCRIPTURE.

In the beginning was the Word. John, ist and ist. "In the beginning was the word”— saith JohnThe life, the light, the truth, for all are one; One all-creating pow'r, all-wise, all-good, In which, at first, the whole creation stood; Moving, and acting in the pow'r alone; How bright, how perfect, and no evil known! How blest was Nature's universal plan, And the fair image of his Maker, man!

The word, the pow'r, is Christ; th' Eternal Son Of God, by whom the Father's will is done; Each is the other's glory; and the love From both the bliss of all the blest above: Angels in Heav'n stand ready to obey, And, as the word directs them, so do they; So must we men, born here upon this Earth, If ever we regain the heav'nly birth;

Lost by poor Adam, in the fatal hour Of lusting after knowledge without pow'r; When, yielding to temptation, tho' forbid To eat what was not good for him, he did: The pow'r of life consenting to forego, For what was told him, would be death to know, He died to his celestial state, and then Could but convey an earthly one to men.

From which to rise, and in true life to live, What but the word, wherein was life, could give? Ingrafted, as an holy seed within,

And born to save the human soul from sin:
The Word made man by virgin birth, and free
From sin's dominion, Jesus Christ is he;
Whom, of pure love, the Father sent to save,
And finish man's redemption from the grave.

This second Adam, healer of the breach
Made by the first, nor sin, nor death could reach;
He conquer'd both; and, in the glorious strife,
Became the parent of an endless life
To all who ever did, or shall aspire
To life, and spirit from this heav'nly sire;
And cultivate the seed which he hath sown
In ev'ry heart, till the new man be grown.

The old, we know, must die away to dust, And a new image rise amongst the just; When, at the end of temporary scene, Christ shall appear, eternally to reign In all his glory, human and divine, When all the born of God, in him, shall shine,

Rais'd to the life that was at first possest,
And bow the knee to Jesus, and be blest.

Since then the cause of our eternal life
Is Christ in us, what need of any strife
In his religion? Of "lo here! lo there!"
When to all hearts he is himself so near?
With pow'r to save us from the cause of ill,
A worldly, selfish, unbelieving will;

To bless whatever tends to make the mind
Meek, loving, humble, patient, and resign'd.

The mind to Christ so far as God shall draw By nature, scripture, reason, learning, law, Or aught beside, so far their use is right, Proclaiming him, and not themselves the light: From first to last his gospel is the same; And of all worship, that deserves a name, "The word of life by faith to apprehend That was in the beginning is the end."

A MEMORIAL ABSTRACT

OF A SERMON PREACHED BY THE REV.
MR. H-

On Proverbs, C. 20, V. 27.

THE human spirit, when it burns and shines,
Lamp of Jehovah Solomon defines-
Now, as a vessel, to contain the whole,
This lamp denotes the body, oil the soul;
(As H observes) which, tho' itself be dark,
Is capable of light's enkindling spark;
But, as consider'd in it's own dark root,
Still wants the unction, and the light's recruit.

Brighter than all, that now is look'd upon,
This lamp of God, at it's creation shon;
The body, purer than the finest gold,
Had no defect in its material mould;
The soul's enkindled oil was heav'nly bright,
Till even mixture darken'd its good light;
And hid the supernatural supply,

That fed the glorious lamp of the most High.

That fatal poison quench'd, in human frame,
The spirit flowing from the vital flame :
Adam's free will consenting to such food,
Death, as its natural effect, ensu'd:
True life departing left him naked, blind,
And spiritless, in body, soul, and mind;
Dead to his paradisic life, a birth
From sin began his mortal life on Earth.

His faith, his spiritual discernment gone,
He fell into a poring, reas'ning one;
Into a state of ignorance he fell,
Which brutal instincts very oft excel:
What his self-seeking will would know was known,
The light of this terrestrial orb alone;
Dark, in comparison, when this was done,
As moon, or starlight to ineridian sun.

What help when lesser light should vanish too, And death discover a still darker view? Had not the Christ of God, sole help for sin, Rais'd up salvation as a seed within? That sprouting forth by penitence, and faith, Could pierce thro' death, and dissipate its wrath;

All true religion teaches them to trim The lamp, that must receive its light from him; From him, the quick'ning Spirit, to obtain The life that must for ever blest remain: The life of Christ arising in the soul, This, this alone makes human nature whole; Makes ev'ry gift of grace to re-unite, And shine for ever in Jehovah's sight.

ON THE

UNION AND THREE-FOLD DISTINCTION
OF GOD, NATURE, AND CREATURE.
PART FIRST.

ALL that comes under our imagination
Is either God, or nature, or creation:
God is the free eternal light, or love,
Before, beyond all nature, and above:
The one unchangeable, unceasing will
To ev'ry good, and to no sort of ill.

Nature, without him, is th' abyssal dark,
Void of the light's beatifying spark;
Th' attraction of desire, by want repell'd,
Whence circling rage proceeds, and wrath un-
quell'd:

But by the light's all-joyous pow'r, th' abyss
Becomes the groundwork of a three-fold bliss.

Creation is the gift of light, and life,
To nature's contrariety and strife;
For without nature, or desirous want,
There would be nothing to receive the grant;
Nor could a creature, or created scene
Exist, did no such medium intervene.

Creature and God would be the same; the thought,
Which books inform us that Spinoza taught,
Would then be true; and we be fore'd to call
Things good, or bad, the parts of the great All:
In whatsoever state itself may be,
Nature is his, but nature is not he.

Like as the dark, behind the shining glass, By hindring rays that of themselves would pass, Affords that glimpse of objects to the view, Which the transparent mirror could not do;

294

So does the life of nature, in its place, Reflect the glories of the life of grace.

Of ev'ry creature's happiness, the growth
Depends upon the union of them both;
And all that God proceeded to create,
Came forth, at first, in this united state;
No evil wrath, or darkness could begin
To show itself, but by a creature's sin.

And were not nature separate, alone,
Such a dark wrath, it could not have been shown:
Its hidden properties are ground as good
For life's support, as bones to flesh and blood:
The false, unnatural, ungodly will,
That lays them open, is sole cause of ill.

When it is caus'd, renouncing, to be sure, All such-like wills, contributes to the cure; That nature's wrathful forms may not appear, Nor what is made subservient domineer; But God's good will all evil ones subdue, And bless all nature, and all creature too.

PART SECOND.

THIS universal blessing to inspire
Was God's eternal purpose, or desire;
Desire, which never could be unfulfill'd;
Love put it forth, and Heav'n was what it will'd;
And the desire had, in itself, the means, [scenes.
From whence the love cou'd raise the heav'nly

Hence an eternal nature, to proclaim
By outward, visible, majestic frame,
The hidden Deity, the pow'r divine,

By which th' innumerable beauties shine;
That by succession without end, recall
A God of love, a present all in all.

From love, thus manifested in the birth

Of Nature, and the pow'rs of Heav'n and Earth,
The various births of creatures, at the voice
Of God, came forth to see, and to rejoice;
To live within his kingdom, and partake
Of ev'ry bliss, adapted to their make.

For as, before a creature came to see,
No other life but that of God could be ;
No other place but Heav'n, no other state;
So, when it pleas'd th' Almighty to create,
From him must come the creature's life within;
Its outward state from nature must begin.

Oh! what angelic orders! what divine,
And heavenly creatures answer'd the design
Of God's communicative goodness, shown
By giving rise to offsprings of his own!
With godlike spirits how was nature fill'd,

And beauteous forms, as its great author will'd!

Thus in its full perfection then it stood,
Seeking, receiving, manifesting good,
By virtue of that union which it had
With him, who made no creature to be bad;
But highly blest; and with a potent will
So to continue, and to know no ill.

Nature's united properties had noneWhence then the change that it has undergone?

ON THE ORIGIN OF EVIL.

EVIL, if rightly understood,
Is but the skeleton of good,
Divested of its flesh and blood.

While it remains, without divorce,
Within its hidden, secret source,
It is the good's own strength and force.
As bone has the supporting share,
In human form divinely fair,
Altho' an evil when laid bare;

As light and air are fed by fire, A shining good, while all conspire, But (separate) dark, raging ire;

As hope and love arise from faith, Which then admits no ill, nor hath; But, if alone, it would be wrath;

Or any instance thought upon, In which the evil can be none, Till unity of good is gone;

So, by abuse of thought and skill, The greatest good, to wit, free-will, Becomes the origin of ill.

Thus when rebellious angels fell,
The very Heav'n where good ones dwell,
Became th' apostate spirits Heil.

Seeking, against eternal right,
A force without a love and light,
They found, and felt its evil might.

Thus Adam biting at their bait,
Of good and evil when he ate,
Died to his first thrice happy state.

Fell to the evils of this ball,
Which in harmonious union all,
Were Paradise before his fall.

And when the life of Christ in men
Revives its faded image, then,
Will all be Paradise again.

A FRIENDLY EXPOSTULATION

WITH A CLERGY MAN, CONCERNING A PASSAGE IN HIS SERMON, RELATING TO THE REDEMPTION OF MANKIND.

'Twas a good sermon; but a close review Would bear one passage to be alter'd too;